Manufacture of felt.



ANTENORE FUSAI, OF BIELLA, ITALY, ASSIGNOR TO ALFREDO BALADA, OF

SAME PLACE.

' MANUFACTURE OF FELT.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 680,522, dated August 13, 1901.

pplication filed February 1, 1900. Serial No. 3,633. No specimens.)

T all whom it may concern: to improve the felting qualities of the fiber- Beitknownthat I, ANTENOREFUSAI, a subsuch, for instance, as gallic acid, nitric acid,

ject of the King of Italy, residing at Biella, and hydrochloric acid and their compounds in the Kingdom of Italy, have invented ceror derivatives. In conjunction with these 5 tain new and useful Improvements in the acids there may be employed tannin or eno- Manufacture of Felt; and I do hereby decz'am'ne, (the coloring-matter of wine,) or sulclare that the following is a full, clear, and fate of copper, or of iron, or their components exact description of the same. or derivatives. The proportions of the said This invention aims to provide anew treatmaterials vary in the preparation of the 1o ment for vegetable fibers to render them cabaths, according to the fineness and quality pable of use in the manufacture of felt. of the felt to be made. If, for example, a

It aims to provide especially new materials good hat-felt is wanted, the vegetable fibers for the manufacture of felt and a new procmust be submitted, after cleaning, to a first ess of manufacturing felt therefrom. bath composed, approximately, as follows: 15 It aims to provide also a felt composed of One thousand parts, by weight, of nitric acid, a new material. two hundred and fifty of mercury, and three The new materials referred to are the vegethousand of water. This bathimparts a yeltable wool or silk fibers known in the trade low color, usually called yellow secrete, to as Kapok and Oeiba. These fibers the fiber on account of the oxidation of the 20 have a roughness not found in cotton and nitrate of mercury dissolved in the bath and have some analogy to wool, though somewhat its adherence to the fiber in the form of an infiner, brighter, and softer. The fiber is soluble precipitate. l/Vhen alarge proportion pierced by a channel of about one-tenth of its of water is employed, the yellow coloration is diameter. While the fiber of cotton is somepale or pallid and is called pallid secrete. 25 what fiat, that of kapok and ceiba is quite This solution is employed in the proportion of round and rough on its surface, whence the from two to three parts, by weight, to one hunpossibility of using it in the manufacture of dred parts, by weight, of water to each two felt. The central channelis empty, as in cotparts, by weight, of the vegetable fibers, the ton, while that of wool is filled with medulbath beingat atemperatureof about 40 0011- 3o lary matter. Though similar to wool on its tigrade. The said fibers are first saturated surface, the new fiber is somewhat smaller. with water. The vegetable fibers are allowed Kapok is the fiber which forms the involucre to remain in this bath for a time, usually of the seedof the Em'odendron cmfractuosum, about ten to fifteen minutes, and they are a tree growing in tropical countries. Geiba then removed from the bath and placed and 35 is obtained from the ceiba tree, which is comallowed to remain in another vessel for about mon in Honduras. According to the process twenty-five hours to dry them and then they of this invention such fibers are rendered caare submitted to the act-ion of a second bath pable of felting by submitting them after a composed of bichromate of potash, two to six thorough cleansing to chemical processes exper cent., by weight, of the weight of fiber 9o 40 erting, oxidating, disintegrating, and rough-- treated 3 tannic acid, one to two per cent.;

cning action upon the outer portion thereof, acetic acid,0ne to two per cent; water,twentyso as to render them capable of felting. five times the weight of fiber treated, and This action is effected by means of baths, the acid coloring-matters of the desired color and first of which contains mercury in solution. in a quantity corresponding to the degree of 45 The second bath contains chromic acid and coloring desired. The vegetable fibers are is made from substances capable of developplunged into said second bath at a temperaing such acidsuch, for example, as biture of about 40 centigrade, and then the chromate of potash, from which chromic acid temperature is raised to about 90 centican be developed by sulfuric acid. To this grade. After they have remained from ten 50 bath may be added other substances possess to fifteen minutes at this temperature they ing properties such as fit them to cooperate are removed to another Vessel, where they are allowed to stand alone for about twenty-four hours and, lastly, dried and blown by the ordinary processes. A further action may be exerted upon the fibers so prepared by means of sulfuric acid during the fulling. The 0rdinary doses of sulfuric acid must be increased not less than one-third, and it will be well to add in the fulling-machine one per cent. of bichromate of potash, tincture of enoct'am'na or other oxidating disintegrating and roughening agents, and coloring matters which will vary in quality and proportions in accordance with the requirements of practice. The preparation of the baths depends also upon the quality and strength of the chemical preparation (pallid or yellow secrete) taken up by the fibers.

It may be said, as a rule, in the treatment of mixtures of animal and vegetable fibers that starting from the hereinbefore-stated formulas as adapted to the manufacture of a felt for a hat the doses of these formulas must be increased in proportion with the quantity of vegetable fiber employed.

For the manufacture of felt for clothes, caps in general, carpets, shoes, 820. the above formulas are susceptible of reduction if, as animal material, wool is employed, the wool having rentering properties much greater than the hair of thehare and the rabbit and being capable, with a small help of disintegrating or roughening agents, of bringing the vegetable materials to the desired point of felting.

In the manufacture of coarse feltsas felts for paper-mills, horse-clothes, beds, &c. where very coarse animal material is used, which is little adapted by itself to cause the vegetable material to form into felt, the doses of the roughening materials must be increased and for every special case a special mixture of them be combined, so as to obtain the desired result,

To improve the felting of the vegetable hair and its combination with the animal hair, it may be useful to mix with the vegetable fibers (before preparing them) the detritus of -animal materials-for instance, the re mainders and the offscourings of hats, residues from the manufacture of felt, clippings, &c. Said ofiscourings are first passed into a strongly-acid bath (sulfuric and nitric acids) to break down the fibers too large and unfelted. Afterward they are put very quickly into an alkaline bath and washed in abundant pure water. The said residues when so treated are ready to be employed and When dried are employed by mixing them in the proportions of from five to forty and even fifty per cent. with the vegetable fibers.

The vegetable fibers properly prepared, as hereinbefore described, either alone or mixed with residues of animal fibers, are felted with the animal fibers by intercalating strata of the same among strata of vegetable fibers, leaving on each outer side of the finished felt a stratum of animal felt, so that the felt looks from the outside exactly like a felt fully made of animal fiber.

Instead of the intercalation of the strata a direct mixture of the vegetable and animal fibers might be made; but the intercalation as described is preferred.

Usually in manufacturing felt for hats a stratum of vegetable fibers is placed between two of animal fibers. Also certain qualities of felts can be made simply of vegetable fibers prepared as hereinbefore described, either alone or mixed with residues of animal fibers.

. No further particulars as to the finishing of the felt are added here, as it can be effected by any of the known processes.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim as new therein, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-- 1. The process of rendering vegetable fiber such as kapok or ceiba capable of felting, which consists in treating the fiber first with a bath containing mercury, and then with a bath of substances capable of developing chromic acid, and in then drying the same.

2. The process of rendering vegetable fiber such as kapok or ceiba capable of felting, which consists in treating the fiber first with a bath containing mercury, and then with a bath of substances capable of developing chromic acid to which have been added disintegrating and roughening agents substantially as specified, and in then drying the same.

In witness whereof I have hereunto signed my name in the presence of two subscribing witnesses.

ANTENORE FUSAI.

\Vitnesses:

YAIRO GAP NI, ENRICOE MARAVA. 

